Weight Loss, Diet Sodas and Weight Gain

When it comes to weight loss & diet sodas, the word ‘diet’ might be fooling us all. As I write this post, I am sipping a cherry-flavored Diet Coke. With that said, I have read some compelling evidence that diet sodas can actually make us GAIN weight. Not good news for me who loves an occasional diet soda, and certainly not good news to almost sixty percent of Americans who regularly consume diet soft drinks.

According to a survey by the Calorie Control Council, a nonprofit association for the low-calorie and reduced-fat food and beverage industry, diet sodas are the second most popular low-calorie, sugar-free products in the country. Such consumption may one reason why so many Americans overweight, and why I can’t seem to lose that last ten pounds.

A new study published in the journal Behavioral Neuroscience, reveals scientific evidence that the more artificial sweeteners we consume the harder the time we have in losing weight.

When It Comes To Weight Loss & Diet Sodas, There Is Some Compelling Evidence That Diet Sodas Can Actually Make Us GAIN Weight

When It Comes To Weight Loss & Diet Sodas, There Is Some Compelling Evidence That Diet Sodas Can Actually Make Us GAIN Weight

Psychologists at Purdue University compared two groups of rats: one was fed yogurt sweetened with real sugar at 15 calories per teaspoon, and the other were fed yogurt sweetened with calorie-free saccharin. The rats given the calorie-free sweeteners ate more food, gained more weight, put on more body fat than their sugar-fed counterparts.

The study’s authors, Susan Swithers and Terry Davidson believe that artificial sweeteners may hinder our body’s ability to regulate food intake. The rats that consumed artificial sweeteners may have experienced a psychological and physiological connection between taste and calories.

Perhaps,if we consume a drink that tastes as though it has a lot of calories but doesn’t, our bodies will search for the calories promised but not delivered, making us hungrier for sweets and high-fat foods.

Such theories may apply to rats, but what about humans? from an eight-year long study directed by Sharon P. Fowler, MPH, and her associates at the University of Texas Health Science Center found that humans also gain weight when ingesting artificial sweeteners.

Fowler’s team studied data on 1,550 white and Mexican-American Americans aged 25 to 64. One third of the 622 participants who began the study at normal weights became overweight or obese when the study ended.

Fowler found that soft-drink drinkers faced the following risks of becoming overweight in the eight-year period:

26 percent for one-half can per day

30.4 percent for one-half to one can per day

32.8 percent for one to two cans per day

47.2 percent for more than two cans per day.

Diet soda drinkers faced the following odds of becoming overweight:

36.5 percent for up to one-half can per day

37.5 percent for one-half to one can per day

54.5 percent for one to two cans per day

57.1 percent for more than two cans per day.

In other words, for each can of diet soda you drink each day increases your risk of becoming obese by 41 percent. Fowler cautioned that diet soda and obesity are necessarily a causal relationship, rather there is an unknown factor found in both obesity and artificial sweeteners.

One possible part of the explanation is that people who see they are beginning to gain weight may be more likely to switch from regular to diet soda, Fowler said. But despite their switching, their weight may continue to grow for other reasons. So diet soft-drink use is a marker for overweight and obesity.

We consumers must understand that just because we drink diet soda doesn’t automatically mean we are on a diet. Many of us have been guilty of ordering a McDonald’s Big Mac, large fries, and a hot apple pie WITH a Diet Coke! Even though we use artificial sweeteners doesn’t mean we are no longer accountable for what we put on our plates.

The reality is that a healthy diet & nutrition program is not just about swithing to products labelled as ‘diet’.

For me, I may think twice about opening another can of Diet Coke, even if it’s cherry-flavored!.